


A Chance Encounter

by Ultra



Series: Moments in Time [34]
Category: Leverage
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Children, Children of Characters, F/M, Post-Canon, Reunions, Surprises
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-09
Updated: 2012-12-09
Packaged: 2020-03-05 12:42:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18828877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ultra/pseuds/Ultra
Summary: “The worst thing one can do is not to try, to be aware of what one wants and not give in to it, to spend years in silent hurt wondering if something could have materialised - never knowing."





	A Chance Encounter

**Author's Note:**

> originally written for caitriona_3 on LiveJournal, based on her prompt (quote by Jim Rohn used as summary).

It made sense to walk away. The cracks had started to show even before the job to end all jobs. If staying together hadn’t been dangerous enough anyway, none of them really believed the team would hold together much longer.

Things had been shaky since Parker and Hardison broke up. Nate’s drinking hadn’t been quite as knocked on the head as they’d hoped. One thing after another pulled at the binds tying the Leverage crew together, and so when it came to parting, nobody shed a tear.

Five years had passed. They had all moved on, their past as Robin Hood types supposedly forgotten, but in truth it would have been impossible. Eliot knew that for sure. He walked the world as he had before, a lone wolf, a shadow, still righting wrongs in his own way. For the most part he had left the States behind, working his way through Africa, Asia, the Middle East. Finally, after all this time, he had reason to be playing on home turf and so here he was in New York.

The apartment he was renting didn’t have a place he could grow his own food, but the market served him well most of the time. Today it seemed he was going to have to make do with the grocery store, though the prospect pretty much filled him with dread. It was getting late, he was hungry, and the kitchen was all but bare for the first time in a long time.

Eliot grimaced as he turned over bags of bruised apples, potatoes full of eyes. He had forgotten how difficult it could be to get decent produce in places like this, but his focus wasn’t on the fruit and veg for long. A small child of about four suddenly tore past him, sure to have taken the legs out from under a lesser man. Eliot saw he was going for the doors and from there would have easy access to the street. He grabbed the kids coat fast and pulled.

Though the little boy landed on his butt with a bump, he didn’t cry. He was back on his feet almost faster than Eliot could react, but only almost.

“Hey, kid,” he said, pulling the boy around to face him. “You shouldn’t be running around alone like that,” he told him, getting the strangest feeling of familiarity when he looked at the boy’s expressive face.

His blond hair was longer, a little like Eliot’s own, and his eyes were so very blue. The expression on his face reminded the hitter of someone he once knew and at the same time just vaguely of a kid that used to look back at him from the mirror...

“Jesse!” called a voice from further down the aisle.

Eliot already knew it was the child’s mother, and that woman’s true identity, before she ever reached his side. As they looked at each other, it was clear she was more shocked to see him than he was to see her. Five years on, Parker was still as beautiful as he remembered, and could still pull the dumbest expressions when she was bemused!

“Hey,” he said, leaving off any name, sure she would be using some new alias he didn’t know.

“Hi,” she replied awkwardly, her gaze still firmly locked on Eliot’s own, even as she grabbed her son by the shoulders and manoeuvred him closer. “You don’t ever run from me like that again,” she said definitely, as she finally looked at Jesse, crouching down to his level. “You wait for me to finish the count, okay?”

Eliot laughed at that, he couldn’t help it. It was so crazy, so... Parker! So was what she had done here, surviving alone, never bothering anyone with the burden of being a single mother, not even him, and he knew already without question that he was Jesse’s father. One night was all they had and that was all it took. Eliot could be oh so mad about her keeping this from him, and yet, what would be the point, he thought, as he watched Parker send Jesse off to get some candy.

“Why?” he asked her then, just the one word because he knew even she would understand exactly what the rest of the question entailed.

“One show only, no encores,” she spoke words Eliot knew he’d spoken himself on several occasions, that night included, just a week or so before the team split for good. “I knew I could deal, I always do, and you... you I was less sure about, even though I kinda wanted to be sure,” she explained.

Eliot pinched the bridge of his nose like he felt a headache coming. This was all a little too much for him right now, the very last thing he had expected. A man so ready for anything, but this was incredible, beyond mind-blowing. The little boy by the counter was his son, a child created by himself and a woman he had never forgotten, could never quite get out of his head.

Parker followed his eyeline to her kid and then just watched Eliot watching Jesse. He looked like him, too often to not notice. There were times she wanted to track him down, just to let him know. Other times to call him and beg him to come find her, be with her, and their child. She had missed him so much, more than Parker ever knew she could miss anybody.

The years they had missed, the happiness they could have had, it was tangibly painful as their eyes met once again. Now, thanks to a chance meeting, that could all change, Parker realised, the moment Eliot reached out and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close.

People say that ignorance is bliss, but they’re wrong. It had been a kind of silent agony for Eliot and Parker, being apart, never knowing the other felt the same. They should’ve gone for it sooner, perhaps, but that couldn’t matter now. They had finally found their way home. Thank God, the worst was over.


End file.
